As the dinner progressed, Richard felt an intoxication that had no foundation in wine; for he was not fond of alcoholic stimulants, and drank very sparingly. There was a strange exhilaration in his surroundings that gave him a novel sensation. Of the hundred and more men and women in the room he knew little or nothing; but he could see that among them were those of both sexes whose faces and bearing indicated refinement and high birth. That there were others whose origin was questionable, and who carried with them the stamp of vulgarity, did not alter, but emphasized, the fact that the noble blood of Bohemia was represented before his gaze. After a time he gave up generalizing about his companions, and found his attention concentrated on the girl who had smilingly touched her glass to him. By the time the cheese and coffee had come he was obliged to admit that she possessed the most fascinating face he had yet seen, and that there was something in the glance of her dark eyes more intoxicating than any cordial he had ever sipped. As he lighted a cigarette, and leaned back in his chair to listen to the songs and speeches that Fenton had told him would follow the dessert, he found himself reproaching his own fickleness, but more than ever determined to make the acquaintance of the jolie Bohemienne.
“Wine, women, and song!” exclaimed a dignified but genial-looking man, arising at the farther end of the room, as if to crystallize in one effort the scattered elements of goodfellowship begotten by the modest but very eatable dinner, “and the greatest of these is”— He paused, as if waiting for a reply.
“Wine,” cried a few; “women,” shouted many; and a solitary voice said “song.”
Turning instantly to the reckless individual who had declared in favor of song, the toast-master called upon him by name to arise and vindicate his position. Blushing more with annoyance than modesty, a young man stood up and broke the silence that followed by chanting in a pleasing but untrained voice a ballad of Rudyard Kipling, set to music by the singer. A round of applause followed, and the ice was broken. Songs and stories followed each other in rapid succession.
“It’s great!” exclaimed Richard in Fenton’s ear; and again he raised his glass to the dark-haired girl, who was puffing a cigarette in a nonchalant way and smiling cordially, now and again, as she caught Richard’s eye.
The toast-master arose, and, putting up his hand for silence, said with simple eloquence,—
“The priests and ministers, the bishops and strolling preachers, have through the ages called themselves ‘divines;’ and, lo! they stand aside, and we, the moderns, give that title in our heart of hearts to the poets, the dramatists, the weavers of tales that touch the soul, the wonder-workers in words and thoughts who have wrought that glorious temple we call literature. Homer and Plato and Horace and Shakespeare and Goethe,—these are the true ‘divines;’ these are the inspired and anointed teachers who, making no demands for our reverence and awe, find all the generations bending the knee before them.”
He paused for breath, and a round of applause drove the tobacco-smoke against the ceiling.
“With this introduction,” he went on, “I will present an old friend of yours, who has written a poem that he has modestly informed me is ‘simply great.’”
A shout of laughter greeted this sally, as a tall, slim man with gray hair and a youthful cast of countenance arose. That he was well known and thoroughly liked was proved by the applause that welcomed him.